When is the weather too bad?

[Hillbilly Rick]

I don't quite understand the long winter layoff. I figger the ground is hard, snow is relatively dry and you don't die of heat stroke. In the hardwoods, the leaves are off so the wind doesn't knock the tops out as easily and you can see better.

 

[coastalfaller]

I don't quite understand the long winter layoff. I figger the ground is hard, snow is relatively dry and you don't die of heat stroke. In the hardwoods, the leaves are off so the wind doesn't knock the tops out as easily and you can see better.

On the coast it's a safety thing. The taller softwood out here combined with heavy wet coastal snow makes for a bad combination. I've been in a helicopter flying over timber with a big fresh dump of snow on it. It was a dense stand and some of the clumps on the tree tops looked like the size of Volkswagon beetles! Getting one of those on the noggin would not be a good thing. That and sometimes just getting to work is the issue. Roads are made out of rock, and with the wet snow, makes it hard to maintain, along with steep switchbacks can make for a bit of a white knuckle drive.

Oh, and production suffers severely too!As Bob, mentioned, after a long season, guys are tired and feeling flush. Slogging through the snow at that time is a definite motivation killer.

 

[palogger390]

For us winter is go time. The ground is frozen so we don't have to worry about soil disturbance. Veneer markets pick up. And the log and pulpwood yards are low form the wet fall. We just deal with the road issues. Last winter we were working on a state timber sale and the access road was a snowmoblie trail that we weren't allowed to plow. And they kept grooming it so you could never get a groove wore in. Good times...

 

[slowp]

There's nothing quite like creeping down a slick, steep grade in the winter. Those heart stopping moments of sliding towards the dropoff.

Crews love to set chokers in waist deep snow too. It makes for character building. I do not miss the days of character building.

 

[slowp]

Character building in progress. The snow wasn't too deep yet. And yes, the road to here can be scary without snow on it. There's one curve where sometimes the rear corner tires on a lowboy hang out.

Turnouts can be few and far away.

Parking is at a premium.

Doesn't it look like these guys are having some kind of fun?

Then there's the worry that it'll snow too much and the equipment will be stuck in the hinterlands until there is a thaw...and the road could wash out....Yup, winter is fun.
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[paccity]

On the coast it's a safety thing. The taller softwood out here combined with heavy wet coastal snow makes for a bad combination. I've been in a helicopter flying over timber with a big fresh dump of snow on it. It was a dense stand and some of the clumps on the tree tops looked like the size of Volkswagon beetles! Getting one of those on the noggin would not be a good thing. That and sometimes just getting to work is the issue. Roads are made out of rock, and with the wet snow, makes it hard to maintain, along with steep switchbacks can make for a bit of a white knuckle drive.

Oh, and production suffers severely too!As Bob, mentioned, after a long season, guys are tired and feeling flush. Slogging through the snow at that time is a definite motivation killer.

i've been knocked down hard from snow slough . it really skrews your day or worse. and our coastal snow is pretty heavy. we call it coast range concrete.

 

[Samlock]

An older co-worker once said: "There's just good weather. Bad thing is if there's no weather at all."

 

[Isna]

Depends on the job: When tree climbing, I try to avoid heavy rain, snow or wind. When in the bucket, wind is the main factor. When doing "regular" cutting, we try to get as much done as possible. We call it quits when we can't stand it anymore. Also depends on how urgent the job is. Once had to dismantle a few trees that were about to fall into a river: Heavy freezing rain, but if the trees weren't removed, they would fall in the river and flood the whole village. Told my crew we had to get the job done, no matter what, before we could get to shelter. 6 hours work in horrible conditions, frozen to death, but got it done. One of my guys started the job, until his fingers were too frozen to handle the ropes. I finished it off. Needless to say the customer was impressed and gave us good "rep". That's when you REALLY appreciate a warm coffee at the end of the day (In this case, we ended around 2PM).

 

[bitzer]

:hmm3grin2orange: I almost choked on my coffee. Some things in this business are the same no matter where you log. I've been hearing that "the next sale will be a better one" line for 45 years.

One of these days, just once, I'd like to hear.."yeah I know this has been a real head banger for you guys, small timber, lousy scale, steep ground, a lot of road work, and a long way to the mill. But wait 'til you see the next sale...it's even worse". I'd probably swallow my snoose.

So that is bull####! I was wondering about that. Actually the job I just moved to Monday has bigger and better timber and is flat (mostly). It has a high canopy too with little understory. He did forgot to mention that its choked with all manner of thorny and prickly #### though. I already tore the sleeves off of two shirts. This stand would be a nightmare in the summer. The longest skid has got to be 10 minutes too.


Winter is go time here too, but it won't frickn go. The next couple of days its trying again. we will see.

 

[slowp]

Oh, Hooktender Keith is in those pictures. He is wearing the yellow raincoat.

 

[floyd]

Long ago, in another century, I scaled logs. The only good part was flying my puddle jumper to work.

Guy I worked with got tired of falling so he went to scaling.

He told me about cutting yellow pine around Burns in the winter. He would shovel enough of the snow out of the well so he & his saw could fit. Then he would fall the tree & ride the butt up & out of the well. He said the snow was 4-6' most of the time so the trees fell slowly.

 

[Hillbilly Rick]

Last 2 days were windy, cold and snowing. The snow didn't matter, cold didn't matter but the wind chill is supposed to drop to -5 at 20-25mph. Not real bad but my co-worker is already sick so I'll spend the day cuttin' firewood and gettin' a first aid kit together.
If the snow here fell out of a top and hit ya on the head, it wouldn't do more than get down the back of the neck and make ya a little uncomfortable.

 

[wowzers]

I got my start for the company I work for now by shoveling snow for a cutter. I'm six four and I fell off a tree and sunk up to my arm pits. Snow doesn't slow us down out here, pretty much nothing will stop the line machines. Our machine operator usually tries to keep the saws just a day ahead of this time of the year so that our trees don't get totally buried. If the roads get too muddy we ride wheelers in and trailer fuel. Nothing like a 45 minute four wheeler ride in the rain at the end of the day. The ground side has to be more careful though because of soil disturbances.

 

[Hillbilly Rick]

Wowzers, snow armpit deep to you would put it up to my eyeballs. The most I've seen was 30"+ on the ground for 30+ days.
That was back in the 70s. So far this year we've only had a couple of dustings. We have had our share of rain, woke up this mornin' to thunder storm warnings, tornado watch and high winds, stayed out of the woods today. Yesterday I had a dead standing tree fall right next to the skidder, wasn't very big but I didn't know that as it went past my eyes.
Soil disturbance is the main reason we don't work in the rain, we expect the landing to get rough but don't want to tear up the hillsides with the skidder. If it starts raining when we're out, we just cut and skid it out when the ground hardens up.
Ride a tree out of the hole in the snow ya dug so ya can cut the tree? Y'all ain't right